MEPs vote in favour of new telecoms law, could lead to universal "three strikes"

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Usually we’ve got much better things to do than watch what European politicians do, particularly in the summer, and that’s probably why they’ve chosen to vote on reforms to a telecoms law which could see a three strikes policy rolled out across EU member states.

We’ve been watching this issue for some time. Virgin Media has teamed up with the BPI, threatened alleged file-sharers and then backtracked. Campaigners believe that the proposed amendments to the Telecoms Bill will, in layman’s terms, force ISPs to pay more attention to what their customers are doing, issue “informative letters” to those suspected of illegally sharing copyrighted media, possibly cut people off from the Internet, and perhaps allow governments to decide what software is legitimate.

One of the MEPs who drafted the proposals, Malcolm Harbour, spoke of his dismay at how various groups had misinterpreted the law. “They have nothing to do with copyright enforcement. The interpretation of them is alarmist and scaremongering and deflects from the intention which was to improve consumers’ rights,” he said.

Shame it doesn’t disguise how much you’re using as well. You could pay them the £10/month and still probably make a saving with some ISPs if you went for their basic “all I use the internet for is driving to the shops and back once a week” tariff.